“Well, I don’t want it back,” said Lendall, scared of where this was going.

“Well, I don’t want it!” exploded Gayle. “What am I supposed to do with all of it now that I don’t want it anymore?”

“I don’t know,” grumbled Lendall, at a loss.

“Well, under the circumstances, it doesn’t seem right for me to keep it.”

“Under what circumstances?” demanded Lendall.

Gayle ignored the question and continued, “And since I don’t want it anymore, I’m gonna give it back.”

And, with that, Gayle headed down the steps of the porch and up the driveway to her Jeep to get all the love Lendall had given her so she could give it back to him.

“Hey! Gayle! Wait—I don’t understand,” called Lendall, following the woman he expected to spend the rest of his life with. “What are you sayin’?”

“It’s not complicated, Lendall!” called Gayle. “I’m getting all the love you gave to me and I’m giving it back to you.”

“Well, I told you—I don’t want it back.” Lendall had followed Gayle down to the driveway. And Gayle opened the rear hatch to her Jeep.

And Lendall stopped short, because the Jeep’s interior light revealed that the vehicle was stuffed to the gills—with full garbage bags.

Lendall watched Gayle as she unloaded the Jeep.

She removed a couple dozen garbage bags from the cargo area.

And she removed a dozen from the backseat.

And a half dozen from the front seat.

And she tossed all the bags out onto the icy driveway.

Gayle would have liked to chuck the bags across the driveway and at Lendall.

But they were shapeless and soft and almost weightless. So they were completely unchuckable.

Once she had emptied the Jeep of all the garbage bags, Gayle grabbed Lendall’s army duffel from the floor of the passenger seat and unceremoniously tossed it out onto the driveway. Whatever was in the duffel bag was much heavier than whatever was in the garbage bags, because it landed with a satisfying, chafey thud.

When Gayle had finished the more-Herculean-than-expected task of unloading the Jeep, she slammed the passenger door closed with a flourish, folded her arms, and waited for Lendall to take what was rightfully his into his house, and then bring out to her what was rightfully hers.

But Lendall wasn’t doing anything—except staring at all those garbage bags. There was something otherworldly about them. They barely seemed earthbound.

Irritated by Lendall’s inertia, Gayle gathered a bunch of the light, shapeless, bulky garbage bags and decided that she would bring them up onto the porch herself and just leave them there for Lendall to deal with.

And she blew past him and climbed the steps and dumped the first batch of bags onto the porch.

As she did, she thought about all the sweet summer days and nights she and Lendall had spent on that porch, laughing, playing cards, and listening to music. And she almost started to doubt her decision to end things with him. But only almost.